Tuesday, 18 December 2018

Brexit Fatigue: No Yawning at the Back

On Friday I happened to be talking to the circulation manager of a member of the Dead Tree press, who was bemoaning in his cups the poor sales of his paper this year (not a very festive topic for an Xmas party, but there we are). Apparently, it's the case across the whole of the medium.And they are in no doubt as to what the cause is. On the one hand, they can't justify not leading almost every front page with Brexit stuff which, in a formal sense, is about as newsworthy as it's possible to be. However, the man on the Clapham Omnibus has tired of it all, and is not buying. Some things, it seems, are too interesting.

Think on, Jezza lad

I just thought I'd pass that on.In other news ... well no, actually, it's Brexit again. It seems that Jezza is determined to underline the point made a couple of days ago that he and his dire entourage have no plan; bewildering friend and foe alike with his personal motion of no confidence. Someone has likened this to a penalty-taker shooting deliberately at a corner flag. Being more inclined towards a military idiom, I have toyed with the parallel of the one-man charge mounted by H Jones at Goose Green. On balance, I prefer the image of Wat Tyler trotting out to meet Richard II. He didn't trot back again, if you recall.

EK - Retail is having its worst period for ten years. And it hasn't been any good for those ten years.If the likes of online super giant ASOS are saying its bad, then the Debenhams and New Looks have no chance.

Everything is against. Tax. Pensions. Employment law. Automation. Energy costs. Import cheating i the shipping of goods and even the bloody weather.

One section of a main high street I was at this morning was entirely barbers. Nail bars. Beauty and piercing places. And cafes. And not a single 'real' shop. Exactly as we predicted would be the case some secen or eight years ago.

Corbyn could have tabled a motion of no confidence in the government and tried to bring the government down. Instead, he tabled a motion of no confidence in the Prime Minister which is no more than a symbolic rebuke. Perhaps he didn’t want to risk forcing a vote without being sure if Labour could win it.

But it’s also possible that the Labour leadership doesn’t want to risk getting into government at a time when it would have to take responsibility for implementing or preventing Brexit. The PLP and Labour’s supporters are just as divided over Brexit as the Conservatives. Any choice a Labour government made would cause bitter conflicts within the party and alienate some section of its support. Tactically, it’s much better to let the Conservatives make the difficult choices and then blame them for the consequences.

Of course, that would be utterly cynical and self-serving and a total abdication of their responsibilities to the nation. But did you really expect anything better?

I have more questions than answers but one outcome I have heard many times is a coming bonfire of the businesses; if the last downturn hit the banks, the next one will devastate firms, I'm hearing. Well, it's already happening on the High Street - but am I right in thinking this has impacted more on chains than on independent retailers? Or rather, that those independent retailers that had managed to survive as such through the lst part of the last century and the first decades of this have a resilience?

Sometimes systems need a severe shock and a clear-out to stimulate reform and growth. Brexit and a financial crash could prove, in the longer term, a tonic for business health however painful in the short term. But only as long as we don't pour tax - waste tax - trying to keep alive firms that should be allowed to die

Raab's proposals today to do just that - for if the downturn and Brexit are co-terminous, it will be impossible to ascribe business stress to either one or the other - is just not a good use of tax money.

Firms holding assets - and there are many - are well placed to pick up some bargains from the spoil heap, new SMEs will be stimulated into growth and attract investment, employment will rapidly recover, and UK plc will be able to re-adjust with agility and alacrity.

Just so long as we dont give way to the greed and power hunger of the global corporates.

Brexit has been, Chinese-style, interesting times - people just know that, regardless of whatever deal or no deal eventually get vomited over the nation, the government will just blithely continue giving as little a shit as it can over anything Not London.

The population of Not London have to navigate post-apocalyptic pathways, masquerading as main roads, rattle about on public transport that has a positively zen attitude about timetables, or even physically manifesting itself, so they can do such things as 'work' and 'shop'

So the population of these dragon-infested wastelands, with their funny accents, curious outrage over their 11 year old children getting groomed by the local kebab shop and quaint traditions such as making cider and black puddings, are a bit more interested to see if the collection of useless turds playing at being adults running a country may have noticed them or not.

I got chatting to woman yesterday, proper old style blue-rinse Tory-turned-Kipper, and she was begrudgingly - VERY begrudgingly - admiring the French for not taking any shit.

When that type is musing the benefits of tossing a few petrol bombs towards authority, I have to wonder how many years we are from our own Gilet Jaunes movement.

It was frankly depressing, listening to fake outrage of MPs today, all because someone called somebody else a rude name in the playground. Have any of them really looked at the condition of much of England lately? Slightly different here in Scotland, but then those of us who live in Not Glasgow are used to being shafted to keep the SNP base in the wretched condition that they seem to enjoy.

I see that Crossrail 2 is shortly to be launched, following on from Crossrail 1, HS2, Northern Line Extension, etc. I don't deny there's a need for transport infrastructure in London, but it might just be nice to have a bit of spending outside the M25 for once. As it is, the only British city with a proper metro system outside of London is the Glasgow Underground, opened in 1896 and never extended. Compare and contrast with the rest of Europe.